Friday, July 4, 2014

CHASING EROS by Sam Cheever

The Chasing Eros box set includes three books featuring Cupids, the Gods of Love, and their struggle against their own weaknesses and magical interference to find love. Chasing Eros is set in a magical world that navigates between modern day Earth and golden Olympus--City of the Gods.

Book 1: Eros Unbridled: In the battle for true love, sometimes those who aren't willing to fight sustain the most damage.

Like generations of Cupids before her, Daphne Charissa is doomed to a long and loveless life. Tall, smart and sexy, Bion Chronos is everything she's ever wanted in a man...and nothing she can ever have. The Fates have decreed that none of the Cupid race will ever know lifelong love. But love has a funny way of testing fate, and the power of a woman's tears should never be underestimated.

Book 2: Eros Unchecked: Love can grow amid monsters and misunderstandings. If only she has the strength to grasp it.

Athena Googlios' new client is everything she thinks she wants in a lover. But Damian Leandar is a man of dangerous secrets and complex problems. Tormented by mythological beasts and struggling with her own innate prejudice...Athena is in danger of letting her perfect man slip away. Just as she realizes how much she wants him to stay.

Book 3: Eros Uncensored: He might have been high on Brimstone when he met her. But he wasn't too drugged to recognize a good thing when she stuck a knife under his chin!

Hermes figured he had no future, so he gave up, wasting his days inhaling Brimstone in a Succubi House on Olympus. Cursed from birth, Nidras knew her future was sketchy at best. But the last thing she intended to do was give up. She thought she had to fight the curse alone, but she never counted on a drug muddled Cupid setting his sights on her and gumming up the works. Especially one as sexy and fun as Hermes. So what if he didn't have the first clue how to protect himself in her dangerous world? It didn't stop him from trying!

Inside the castle, we kept to the walls and shadows down a maze of long, stone hallways. My inner compass told me we were heading toward the back of the palace, deep into its ugly, stone bowels. The air was cold, damp and smelled like mildew. The stone walls we scraped against were covered in green slime. The floor was slick with the same green stain.

My curly toed shoes didn’t have much traction against the slime. It was all I could do to stay upright.
The only light in the halls came from the occasional torch, sending smelly, black oil smoke into the air to mix with the mildew.

All around us the skitter of little critter feet danced across the stone floor. Probably rats.

“I like what he’s done with the place.”

“Shh!”

I lowered my voice. “This place is like a bad cliché.”

She glared at me but didn’t respond.

We climbed several sets of stone stairs and emerged into a larger, slightly better lit area. The large, wooden door opposite the stairwell was guarded.

I looked at Nidras and sneered.

The two gremlins were about three feet tall. They had soft, dark brown fur covering their bodies and a lighter, golden fur on their faces.

Their brown eyes were enormous and soft, giving them a decidedly squeezable look.

Nidras shook her head and stepped out, knives in hand.

The gremlins blinked once, twice and then were suddenly airborne. They hit us in a wash of fur and froth, their tiny little fur faces transformed in the blink of an eye into gaping maws filled with razor sharp teeth.
My rabid teddy bear clamped its teeth over the forearm I’d instinctively thrown up to protect my face and worked it with surprising strength. I swung my arm hard in an attempt to dislodge it but the thing held on, its teeth ripping through skin, muscle and even bone as I tried to shake it off me.

In my panic I momentarily forgot to use my sword.

Nidras had flung her gremlin to the ground and was plunging a knife into its tiny chest. I couldn’t get my teddy bear off me.

Finally, in desperation, I grabbed my sword and pulled it free with my left hand, arcing it through the air toward the furry little body.

The gremlin swung its back legs up and wrapped them around my arm, making itself too small a target for me to reach with my sword. Unless I wanted to lop my own arm off.

Pain radiated from my torn and bleeding arm. I was pretty sure I’d have a big scar.

I looked up and saw Nidras standing with her arms crossed, one dark eyebrow lifted in a definite “I told you so” expression. Her knives were back in their sheaths.

“You could help me here.”

She shrugged. “It’s just an oversized teddy bear.”

Okay, I probably deserved that.

I swung around and slammed the gremlin up against the wall. My elbow screamed from the impact but the thing stopped chewing on my arm and blinked. I slammed it a second and then third time, finally managing to drop it to the ground at my feet.

Blood ran from my arm as I jammed my sword into the gremlin’s chest, finishing it off.

I motioned toward the door. “After you.”

Nidras’ face softened as she looked at my torn arm. “Let me heal that for you.”

I shook my head. “I’m wearing it as a reminder that I’m an ass.”

Her perfect, peach-tinted lips tipped up slightly at the corners. “How about if I heal it and just keep tellingyou you’re an ass?” When I still hesitated she offered, “I can leave a scar to remind you.”

I thought about this for a minute. My hand was already going numb and I figured it would be hard to use my sword soon. “Okay.”

“Watch the door while I work.” Nidras placed exquisitely soft hands over my forearm and closed her eyes.
Energy and light flooded the area around and under her hands and I gasped as intense heat infused tender, torn flesh. Gritting my teeth against the pain, I kept one eye on the door as pain seared up my arm and made my pulse pound in my temples.

Finally the pain and heat slid away and Nidras stepped back.

I looked at my arm. “There’s no scar.”

She shrugged, pulling her knives. “So I lied. I’m pretty sure you’ll have lots more reminders that you’re an ass.”